This invention relates to tube-in-shell heat exchangers and is primarily directed to exchangers for effecting heat exchange between liquid metal and water.
Liquid metal, such as sodium, is used in the nuclear reactor art as a coolant for fast breeder reactors mainly because of its high thermal capacity. Because of the high operating temperatures and the aggressive nature of the liquid metal heat exchangers for use as superheaters and reheaters have been made from austenitic steel but considerable difficulty has been experienced with these units. In spite of the most stringent quality control tests during manufacture, tube-to-tube sheet joints have failed.
It is an object of the invention to provide an improved tube-in-shell heat exchanger for use in heat exchange between liquid metal and water and less prone to failures which could result in sodium water reactions.